Yesterday Kris Brogan on her Friends of Kris Brogan Facebook page put out what she is calling a "call for action". The following is taken right off her campaign Facebook page:
This is the call to action! We are working to make sure the message is out that the Brogan campaign is about community engagement, listening to the needs, finding the solutions, working together and a leader who will provide support and direction to build our community!
When looking into Kris Brogans history we can find no examples of Kris Brogan finding solutions to neighborhood problems. We have found several examples of Kris and Mick Brogan trying to get the community to bring solutions to them, ie: money, to save their pizza shop but the closest we can come to community investment is Kris calling for the neighborhood to pre-pay for pizza by buying gift certificates to papa's pizza, but we believe she knew even then that those gift certificates would soon be no good!
As for the working together, Kris is know around City Hall for not working well with others. Staff reports show that shortly after Kris Brogan was hired by Mayor Belton both staff and the Mayor began to regret this decision. Working with Kris Brogan was tough at best as it was either the way Kris wanted it or it was not to be done at all!
Last but not least Kris says she wants to provide support and direction to build our community. Kris has the idea and has put it out there for all to see that her idea of building the North side is to build more low income supportive housing in North. The one idea she has shared is to put these low income buildings on the light rail corridor.When you look at the Alliance buildings she has worked on and the RS Eden buildings it is not the local North Minneapolis people that are placed in these buildings, its the down and out from all over the city. This will not help the people of North? It is just the same as the Salvation Army idea but on a smaller scale! At the meeting with the Salvation Army, Kris never came out against them moving to North Minneapolis, she road the fence on this issue. We have said it before but will say it once again, Kris was most likely looking to make a dime on this project OR as in the past Kris has made connections with the Salvation Army and is looking to keep them in her back pocket for a later date.
The buildings Kris Brogan was a part of on Lyndale and Lowrey bought and ran by RS Eden are filled with people fresh out of jail and prison or the RS Eden treatment center in downtown. These are not filled with the poor and needy people here in North Minneapolis. It is becoming a storage shed for the people that cant get housing in other areas and anytime we "store" people that have troubles in one area we increase the risk of crime.
Part of how Kris Brogan gets the buildings in North Minneapolis is by using high end calculations on who will be living in the building. But like most things Kris Brogan the scale she uses is off and has a low end median income also. The people that make 50 plus thousand a year have of course more options available and they are not going to stay in North or move to North Minneapolis just because Kris Brogan builds it. The people on the higher end of her scale of course will jump at and be excepted into buildings in Northeast, Uptown, and other already cleaned up areas of town.If your property is surrounded by low income housing projects that offer services or not to their renters your property value is not going to climb, its going to remain the same for many years or its going to fall.
The best way to raise property values is to clean up the neighborhood, to offer services the people already here need and want. The reality is Kris Brogan can't offer this! She tried putting a pizza place in north but when the community called for home delivery Kris and Mick said "NO"- it was not until they got butt deep in debt that they tried delivery but by that time it was too late. As with all things Kris Brogan she will do it her way until or when in failure mode she will be open to other ideas. The no delivery policy at Papa's is a perfect example of this, Kris stated many times that they had sunk money into that patio and it was there dream that people sitting on the patio would clean up the neighborhood.
We are not saying that the work RS Eden does is not important, it is! What we want people to understand is that we have our fill of these types of projects in North Minneapolis! We need to move forward with safety and building affordable ( check the difference between low income housing and affordable housing) housing on these empty lots. As with all things it takes time but its important the footings are placed the right way so that they can be built on! Kris Brogan's plan does not do this.
